-- OR WAIVE GOODBYE TO KEY FEDERAL PROTECTIONS
The bill to expand “Ed-Flex” to all fifty states is expected to reach the Senate floor on Tuesday afternoon, March 2, or Wednesday, March 3. With limited exceptions, the bill will allow states to decide for themselves which parts of key federal laws they and local schools systems don’t have to comply with (without even having to ask the federal government for a specific waiver).
You must act immediately to:
(A)Contact Senators
(B) Get the word out to others in your network about the need to contact their Senators.
Tell them to:
(1) Oppose passing the Ed Flex bill at this time – as a dangerous and unnecessary approach to law-making.
Congress has set minimum conditions for states and local school systems to use federal education funds, in order to ensure program quality and equity -- for example under Title I and the Perkins Act. The bill tells states, you can take the money and then decide for yourself which of those quality and equity requirements you want to ignore. Further, the notion that the slow pace of school reform is the result of these federal requirements is very wide of the mark: – these provisions have been designed to push reform and are quite flexible; and most of the “rules” that people in schools complain about turn out not to be federal requirements at all. (This last point reflects the lack of information, assistance, and implementation concerning federal reforms.) Finally, it makes little sense to pass a bill now that says that states may waive state and local requirements of key ESEA programs – especially Title I – before Congress considers what those requirements will be.
(2) Support amendments -- for example by Senators Kennedy, Wellstone, and Reed – that would limit some of the potential damage, including:
(a) Prohibiting waiver of the core local and state program requirements in both Title I and the Perkins Vocational Education Act.
Title I requires that schools take steps to provide children with accelerated curriculum, effective instruction, high quality teachers, and help in addressing individual learning difficulties so that they can master high standards – along with state support for schools interventions when schools are not succeeding. These program components, along with the accountability system, should not be subject to these waivers.
Perkins was just passed by Congress last fall. Its key program requirements were scaled back to a basic minimum -- some quality-oriented provisions designed to address the concerns of parents and others that vocational education doesn’t channel high-school students away from challenging academics and into narrowly defined job training and some equity provisions to ensure equal access and necessary services for members of special population – both of which could be dispensed with under the provisions currently in the bill.
(b) Requiring that parents, educators, and advocacy organizations get real notice and opportunity for input before a state or local waiver is granted.
The current bill requires some notice before a state gets overall waiver authority, but once the state has that authority there’s no obligation to notify parents and others when it is considering a waiver request.
(c) Making sure that waivers aren’t granted without first showing the necessity to do so.
For more information, contact the Center for Law and Education, (202) 986-3000, cle@cleweb.org. And please let CLE know what kind of response you are getting.